Friday, May 22, 2015

President Obama's response to a message I sent him opposing the TPP

Some time ago I sent a message to President Obama opposing the TPP and asking him to reconsider his position. I received the following email today from the White House. I have written and posted much against the TPP and in fairness, I thought I also should share the President's response:

Dear Dan:

Thank you for writing. My Administration is pursuing a trade agenda that will place our workers, farmers, manufacturers, and businesses at the center of the 21st-century global economy—one that promotes both our interests and our values. Trade done right is a critical part of my strategy to create jobs, spur growth, and strengthen the middle class.

With 95 percent of the world’s customers living outside our borders, our ability to access new markets is vital to our economic well-being. The export of American-made products supports millions of jobs here at home that pay up to 18 percent more than non-export-related jobs. And, 98 percent of the more than 300,000 companies that export are small businesses. However, even though more American businesses are exporting than ever before, most businesses still don’t export anything—leaving an incredible amount of opportunity that can be unlocked for our middle class. To take advantage of that opportunity and level the playing field for our workers and businesses, we’re moving forward with the most ambitious trade agenda in American history, including the Trans-Pacific Partnership.

In the Asia-Pacific region, the Trans-Pacific Partnership will knock down barriers that block American made goods and services while promoting high standards in the fastest-growing region in the world, including the strongest enforceable labor and environmental provisions of any trade agreement.

To protect our workers, the trade agreement will require countries to set a minimum wage, protect the freedom to form unions and collectively bargain, and work to end child and forced labor. To preserve the environment, it will require countries to take tangible steps to curb wildlife trafficking, crack down on illegal logging, and prevent overfishing. That’s why conservation organizations like the World Wildlife Fund and The Nature Conservancy agree that the enforceable provisions in the Trans-Pacific Partnership are a critical step forward for environmental protection.

Some prior trade agreements, like the North American Free Trade Agreement, or NAFTA, have not lived up to their promise. The Trans-Pacific Partnership addresses these problems through strong enforcement mechanisms, including for the labor and environmental standards. This means that if our trading partners, including Canada and Mexico, aren’t playing by the rules, we can hold them accountable. The agreement also includes new rules that make sure our businesses and property owners are protected from having property taken by foreign countries, while making sure that foreign corporations can’t undermine or get around our own laws and regulations. Because we know that unfair currency practices by some governments hurt our workers, businesses, and farmers, we are working with Congress on new tools and standards that will make it easier for us to protect American workers and firms from unfair competition.

The Trans-Pacific Partnership is also America’s opportunity to lead in the Asia-Pacific. The alternative to this agreement is to let other powers, like China, carve up the region and drive down standards through bad trade agreements. We cannot stay on the sidelines while China and other countries write the rules of the road. We have to seize this opportunity to help American workers and businesses compete on a level playing field in the world’s largest markets in the decades to come.

To help us secure the benefits of the Trans-Pacific Partnership, we are working with Congress to enact Trade Promotion Authority, which allows Congress to put forward its priorities for negotiating trade agreements. The new version of Trade Promotion Authority Congress is considering guarantees that future trade agreements, including the Trans-Pacific Partnership, will have progressive, pro-worker, and pro-environment standards. This gives us the leverage to bring home the best possible agreements for the American people.

The new Trade Promotion Authority mandates unprecedented transparency by requiring that any trade agreement be published online for 60 days before I sign it, and Congress will then have months to review, debate, and hold hearings on the details of the agreement before they vote on it. And while we have not yet finalized the Trans-Pacific Partnership, the current agreement is available for all members of Congress to read and review, and we have conducted over 1700 regular briefings with members of Congress on the status of the negotiations and have provided full similar briefings for labor groups, environmental groups, and other interested parties.

With a highly educated workforce, an entrepreneurial culture, strong rule of law, and abundant sources of affordable, clean energy, the United States has what’s required to be the world’s manufacturing hub. My Administration is working every day to help businesses locate, grow, and hire here so that our businesses ship goods all over the world stamped with "Made in the U.S.A." The good news is that this is already beginning to happen—over the last few years, our manufacturers have been steadily creating jobs in the U.S. for the first time since the 1990s. Good trade deals like the Trans-Pacific Partnership will continue that trend and ensure that jobs are not outsourced, but rather are created here at home. We will continue to push forward on these efforts because we know that when the playing field is level, American workers and businesses don’t just compete, they win.

Again, I appreciate your message. I am confident we can support job growth at home and boost exports while promoting our values and raising standards around the globe.

Links to audio clips of Theodore Roosevelt speeches

TR in the West

Click on photo to go to the Theodore Roosevelt Center at Dickinson State University

Robert LaFollette

Click on his photo to see a film, with sound, of a campaign speech of Robert LaFollette in 1924, when he ran for President on the Progressive Party ticket, urging the people to be “aggressive” in resisting corporate power and influence. He received 17% of the vote and carried only Wisconsin. He died the next year. The father of Progressivism, Robert LaFollette was the first to use the word “Progressive” to describe the movement he started in Wisconsin. He first was Governor of Wisconsin and then was a Senator. From Wikipedia: “In 1957, a Senate Committee selected La Follette as one of the five greatest U.S. Senators, along with Henry Clay, Daniel Webster, John C. Calhoun, and Robert Taft. A 1982 survey asking historians to rank the "ten greatest Senators in the nation's history" based on "accomplishments in office" and "long range impact on American history," placed La Follette first, tied with Henry Clay.”

Definition of Progressivism

In using the term “progressive” I mean what it meant in its early years, a philosophy of government, or governance, of the proper role of government in a democracy, and how public officials carry out their responsibilities to the people. Progressive government can be a force for good when it limits its activities to doing those things that need to be done but cannot be done by the people for themselves. The duty of public officials is to all the people, not to special interests.

Progressivism is not a synonym for liberalism, as it often is used today. Today's progressives probably are liberal in many, if not most, of their beliefs, but not all liberals are progressives. Although a descendant of classic liberalism, true progressivism is not ideological. It is pragmatic. It is neither liberal nor conservative, nor Democrat nor Republican. It is not capitalistic, nor socialistic. It seeks to make the existing system work, and that sometimes means protecting capitalism from itself by taming its most aggressive features through legislation and regulation.

Most of the early Progressives were Republicans; the later ones, Democrats. Progressives are problem-solvers and they will borrow ideas from both political parties, as well as from any other source, if the ideas present a practical solution to an important problem.

Basic pragmatic progressivism is more consistent with the American character than any other governmental philosophy, and its historic leaders have been - sometimes, for other reasons, only briefly - among the most popular leaders the nation ever has had. We can solve our major problems with another progressive period of government. I believe this can be made to happen with the right kind of leadership, programs and strategies, which I describe in this book.

- Introduction, Let's Do What Works and Call it Capitalism, by Dan Riker. Excerpts of this as-year unpublished book are posted on this blog, on http://www.danriker.blogspot.com and on http://www.dailykos.com.